


That Boy is a Monster

by Echinoderma



Category: Subarashiki Kono Sekai | The World Ends With You
Genre: Body Horror, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-21
Updated: 2015-09-21
Packaged: 2018-04-22 16:21:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4842239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Echinoderma/pseuds/Echinoderma
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Don't ever forget. Joshua Kiryu is not human.</p>
            </blockquote>





	That Boy is a Monster

**Author's Note:**

> prose. im always a slut for angels

 

I.

His partner wraps (six) fingers around his wrist and- its fine fine fine just the game playing tricks, after all, of course. The sixth isn't real and the twelfth less so, just wax paper, and brittle bird bones pressing against his skin.

\-----

 

II.

Neku taps under his left eye, waiting for Joshua to mirror him.

 

"There's- you've got something here, Josh."

 

He watches him slips a finger under the lip of the cut and pull away, underneath is slimy yellowed sclera and sickly violet iris and, oh what is that, a sideways slitted pupil staring through his head-

It only lasts a second, blink and it's gone, then he's prodding pale cheek like that's all it's ever been.

\----

 

III.

He's already dead but his heart quivers like the living, an ache that squeezes the marrow out of his bones, fills him with up with acid and lead and cold, jagged glass.

 

"Do you need a break?" Joshua's words leave a sour taste in the air, like chlorine or a coming storm- Neku can see the vibrations ripple in the air and it hurts hurts hurts hurts hurts even to listen as it rushes him from all sides and presses against him, insistent on his attention.

\-----

 

IV.

 

They're not fangs. Joshua's teeth are long and spindle-thin with tiny needle points, like fishbones, translucent and flexible and bowed under the pressure of his jaw. Thousands of them crowded behind his stupid slender lips, spit-shiny gloss gleaming in the flash.

 

"Nice smile." Joshua titters, looking over Neku's shoulder at the photo, so close neku can see the thin webs of purple under his filmy skin.

 

\------

V.

 

And after the battle he cranes his neck to peer at his partner and stares; the entirety of Joshua's arm is ashen grey and squirming, like something wants out underneath, pushing into the atmosphere. straining.

 

Joshua dusts himself off with a grotesque twist of muscle. "A little worse for wear, hmm?"

 

His cadence is all wrong, a phonetic reading of a language he's never heard. The smile on his face is utterly alien like his muscles don't know which way to pull.

  
  


\----

_It makes sense, after it sll, as he flips manically through Mr. H's reports. The composer's music places a great strain on those beneath him-_

\-----

 

VI.

  
  
  


It's dark, the witching hour. Neku jolts back into reality, knocking pens and brushes from his desk, shivers running down his spine, a rattle in his throat. A weariness lurks behind his eyes, he presses his palms against the aching sockets as he adjusts to the sudden state of consciousness, everything hazy and indistinct, the low incandescence of his desk lamp the only light. The last thing he remembers is leaning over his desk, joshua's lilting voice whispering softly into his mind-

 

(He's been doodling, idle scribbles of noise in the margins of his notes: kangaroos and mammoths, ravens and snarling, angry wolves. Ignoring the setting sun, the long shadows along the floor.

 

He draws his friends too, quick, messy portraits taking over the page. Shiki, Beat and Rhyme- and-

His hand spasms, a thick line of graphite slicing through the rough rendering of Joshua's eyes. Laughter rings in the back of his thoughts, and he feels compelled, the imprint a shock to his suddenly sluggish system.

 

_is that what i look like to you?_

 

_let me show you the truth._

Neku drags his hand against his brow, halfway to getting up when he catches his reflection in the mirror, and stops dead in his tracks. He's naked, somehow, a tapestry of lines criss crossing every inch of his skin- bold, obsidian strokes along the soft outline of his clavicle, sharp angles and sweeping curves along his ribs, spots of ink bloomed along his hips, like bruises. A gilded noise symbol rests over his heart, gold ink glimmering in the quaint lighting, twitching with each shallow breath.

 

On his forehead, some esoteric script meticulously written in tiny symbols along his hairline when he pulls up his bangs. Black follows the contours of his eyes, winged at the tips and trailing along his jawline, down his tendons, each line flanked with more of the winding, indecipherable language.

 

Miraculously, neku looks away from his reflection long enough to see the same patterns bleeding onto his walls, calligraphy continued throughout the entire room, floor to ceiling. Feathers on the far wall, amorphous tendrils curling along the ground, a human torso, back turned to him but still watching- a half-lidded eye embedded into every vertebrae. Divine horror vacui, the whole room turned into the visage of an angel.

 

_i would burn you from the inside out-_

_but still. i can show you_

Neku stumbles, feverish, disoriented by the dizzying array of markings around him, on him, leaving the desk only to slump against the wall, forehead smudging away a splay of primary pinions. A rustle of wind and breathy laughter startle him as he feels the air solidify, the sudden weight of another being in his space. Familiar, but so utterly inhuman; blood-warm wetness against his neck as thin, emaciated limbs come to rest along his shoulders, another pair circling his waist.

 

 _aren't i beautiful?_ Joshua hisses, almost a croon, his hair brushing the shell of Neku's ear, so feather-light as to be intangible shadow against his skin.

 

But his touch; fire sparks along his nerves wherever he meets Joshua's skin, blood boiling and beating below the surface, a throbbing pressure at his temples in time with his rapid, racing heart. Sunburn blooms along his back, Joshua's radiance like the sun and it's too much, too much, to have this bit of the cosmos in his room, in his mind. There's too much for him to process assaulting his perceptions, a star warping gravity, drawing in his attention and never letting go.

 

_what do you think, Ne-ku?_

 

Whatever reply he had crinkles and burns to cinders in his throat. The lamp shatters, the gentle rain of glass lost in the tones of Joshua's voice, a heavy reverb playing over and over, echoing in his mind. Against the wall, he can see only the hard line of his shadow and the brilliant edge of white in his vision, the only source of light the whirring, crackling halo of plasma suspended in the air

It's not his room, his world anymore; just him and this creature in some pitch, abyssal space-

 

He gasps, nearly screams as Joshua yanks him backwards, farther into his embrace, Neku's trembling legs collapsing- the walls are far, far away and undulating, breathing, beating, everything melding together, soft tallow and viscera birthed from his brushwork- the hands on his shoulder trailing upwards to rest at his temples. Something lingers in the wake of his fingertips, warm and honey-thick, velvet running down his neck- blood, Neku realizes when the sharp tang of copper reaches his nose, angelic touch dissolving the skin where it rests against him for too long.

 

(Distantly, he notices the hands around his waist have burned their way to the bone, slender fingers pressed against the dip of his ilium, whatever agony there should have been curiously absent from his mind.)

  
  


It's fear that plucks his veins like string music, body taut and quivering as Joshua spins him around, covering his eyes. his vision is red, red, red, the light shining through capillaries, painless, even as Joshua's Grace literally burns him away, the tips of his fingers and toes blackened, shriveled, cracked.

 

(He feels his skin around his eyes give way to pulp and ash; Joshua's palms are just bone and sinew wrapped in the thinnest, gossamer gauze.)

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


_Joshua spins him around, kisses him, then vanishes, dissipated into ozone and silver luster on neku's skin._

__  
  
  



End file.
